South Side Sox Top Prospect No. 66: Trey Michalczewski

There’s still a pretty clear line to Chicago from Birmingham, if this multifaceted player can make a strong 2019 push

By whisoxman20051917 Apr 9, 2019, 9:21pm CDT

**Crunch time:** With touted prospects below him on the 3B depth chart, the time for Michalczewski to make a move toward Chicago is now.

Trey Michalczewski
6´3´´
210 pounds
Bats: Both
Age: 24
SSS rank among all third basemen in the system: 4

Michalczewski has been a bit of an enigma since signing as a seventh-round pick from Jenks, Okla., as a prep third baseman in 2013. It’s hard to believe now, but Michalczewski was actually ranked as the system’s fourth-best prospect at the beginning of the 2015 season, behind only Tim Anderson, Carson Fulmer and Spencer Adams. Plenty of big things were expected of Michalczewski due to his size, strength and athleticism.

However, his numbers have been meh throughout his six-year minor league career: .248/.322/.381, with a combined 50 homers, 345 RBIs, 30 stolen bases, 255 walks and 759 strikeouts over 2,547 at-bats. His career high of 11 homers came in 2017, with Winston-Salem and Birmingham; his career high of .262 happened in 2014, with Kannapolis and Winston-Salem. Michalczewski’s numbers have been consistently mediocre over the years, with little uptick after repeating seasons at various levels in the system.

Michalczewski didn’t have an exceptional 2018. For the year, he hit .253/.302/.377, with six homers, 65 RBIs, four stolen bases, 27 walks (5.4%) and 131 strikeouts (26.0%). Although his size profiles at the hot corner, Michalczewski’s bat seems to profile best at second base. It’s telling that the White Sox went outside of the organization to fill out the hot corner at Charlotte with D.J. Peterson, and continues to list Gerson Montilla higher on its depth chart, rather than promote Michalczewski. It seems that Michalczewski will need to have a career season in order to earn a sniff at the majors in the next year or two.